Izroulia: Hunt for the Lost Pod

Short authors chat about the characters

I felt like adding one more thing before I start work on the second series. And that's the inspiration behind each of the characters. These characters have been developing since I started this story in 2012, and over the years they've changed and evolved into who they are now. There's still 3 characters yet to make an appeal as they come in series 2. So they won't be mentioned here for spoiler reasons. For now, we stick with the series 1 chapters. So, let's begin.

Aries Natuica

When I first started writing this, it was with the intention of making it a YouTube series with two friends at the time. Obviously that went nowhere as we were in primary school at the time. But we were all going to play a character each, and Aries was mine. Although at the time I hadn't had my gender awakening and Aries was first called Stephanie, then Tessa. And once I had my gender awakening, so did Aries.

Aries isn't a self insert, but they were intended to be the character that I played. So we share a gender identity and have loosely similar appearances. Basically they're my transition goals appearance wise.

Their personality and backstory were inspired by a few of my favourite characters of all time. L Lawliet from Death Note in particular was what gave me the idea to give Aries a foster parent. As L is also an orphan who ended up with a foster parent after being given up. L's eyebags also made it into Aries design, as well as his extensive knowledge on one particular topic.

Another character that went into Aries was Hiccup from HTTYD. One of my childhood favourites. The determination to fix Izroulia came from Hiccups determination to train dragons and prove they're safe. The sass and running head first into danger was heavily inspired by Hiccup.

I haven't given Aries any diagnoses, but since I and these characters that inspired them are very Autistic/ ADHD coded, Aries comes off like that too at times. I left it open for them, they can have one or both of those if the reader so chooses. But they're definitely not neurotypical.

Icarus Perri

Icarus is an amalgamation of all the girly, ditzy, fashionable and sometimes tropical themed characters from my childhood. Cleo from H2o, Felicity from the sleepover club, Draculaura from monster high, Merliah from barbie in a mermaid tail, Aquamarine from... Aquamarine. The tween girl media of the 2000s has such a chokehold on my nostalgia. And Icarus is the love child of all of that. I used to love those beach themed bedrooms in the 2000s, and I always pictured the girls that had them as people like Icarus.

But I also wanted to show that these ditzy girly-girl characters can be more than just a punchline and hold their own as a character. Hence why I gave her dyslexia. She's not a dumb bimbo, she has a reason for being a bit scatter brained and that's OK. She's still thriving despite that, she still has best friends despite that.

I also decided to make her half Hawaiian not because she'd a typical tropical aesthetic girl, but because Hawaii has so much history and mythology around the ocean since you know, Hawaii is made up of islands. It made sense for Icarus, someone who ended up a mermaid with a deep love for the sea would have family roots in the islands of Hawaii. Her mothers side of the family raised her on the stories of the myths and taught her traditions like Hula from a young age which only grew her love for the sea.

Pandora Edge

Pandora is a more chilled out version of the smart bookish girl character. She came from all those movies where the 'nerd' / sporty tomboy gets a makeover at the end. Expect I didn't give her a makeover because she doesn't need one, none of those 'nerd' /sporty tomboy characters did. The smart, bookish character isn't less of a person because they're not into glitter and makeup.